


In My Mind

by queerpb



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: AU where Max suffers a mental break and gets put into the same mental hospital as Nathan, Canonical Character Death, F/F, F/M, I can dream, I know that Nathan would face jail time but......., Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Mental Health Issues, Mental Institutions, Nathan Prescott redemption, Past Child Abuse, Past Chloe Price/Max Caulfield, Past Sexual Abuse, Suicide Attempt, Threats of Rape/Non-Con, past Rachel Amber/Nathan Prescott
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-01
Updated: 2016-06-30
Packaged: 2018-07-19 08:05:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7352815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queerpb/pseuds/queerpb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the worst six months of her life, Max suffers a breakdown unlike any other. Admitted to a psychiatric hospital by her mother, Max has to learn to cope with what has happened.</p>
<p>That's easier said than done with she's within five hundred feet of the man who shot Chloe, at all times.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In My Mind

**Author's Note:**

> There's a suicide attempt in this chapter!!!

Max Caulfield regards the last six months of her life as Hell. In six months, she has seen everything she could handle; from royally fucking up time, to watching her best friend die in the bathroom, to having to testify in a courtroom with her murderer, to trying to return to her life. The ability to manipulate time has come and gone, and she hopes it had gone to terrorize someone else. She wouldn’t wish what she had to do on her worst enemy.

 

Max regards Nathan Prescott as her worst enemy. She knows she shouldn’t. She knows that he was used by everyone. If it wasn’t for her, Nathan would be dead in the ground with Rachel Amber. Instead, he’s rotting in some mental hospital while Chloe Price rots in the ground. 

 

Chloe comes to Max, these days. Max sees her in the color blue (panic attacks follow). Max sees her in random articles of punk clothing (panic attacks follow). At first, Max was only being reminded of Chloe. She could handle it then. She would just lock herself in her Seatlle room and either sleep for days or watching Netflix until she passed out. 

 

Then, came the nightmares.

 

There were always so many. Some of them were happy, like what if she had saved Chloe; they were traveling across the world, far away from the ruins of Arcadia Bay. Some were sad; play-by-plays of her funeral. Some were hellish; like Chloe screaming and crying over how Max chose a town over her best friend. (She did, didn’t she?) And some weren’t even about Chloe; Rachel Amber telling her how she died, or Nathan Prescott in the Dark Room, or Mr. Jefferson finding her again. She should have known when she woke up screaming for the third time this week, that this was bigger than her. But, Max didn’t want help from anyone. She had caused so much trouble already, she didn’t want help. 

 

After the nightmares, it only got worse.

 

**

 

Max was home all the time now. She dropped out of Blackwell and moved back to her parents house. They were happy to have her back, but she was not happy to be there. She threw away her shot, and her scholarship. Blackwell did everything they could but it wasn’t enough. Mandated, school-appointed therapists could only do so much. They offered her a full ride, if she changed her mind.  

 

She hardly recognized herself. Short, choppy hair was replaced by long, messy locks. Dark eye makeup was replaced by dark under eyes. Journal entries were replaced with breakdowns. 

 

Everyone said it would get better, so why hadn’t it? 

 

Vanessa and Ryan Caufield were concerned for their daughter but they knew that life couldn’t stop for Max, or for them. So, they carried on. They kept on. They had lives and intended to keep them. Vanessa thought that carrying on like nothing had changed would help Maxine. It was hard for everyone to adjust. To Max, it just felt like no one cared. 

 

Max couldn’t handle it when she first saw Chloe.  _ Really  _ saw her. Her parents were out, gone to the store apparently. It was bordering on three weeks since Max had seen the outside and about a day since she had eaten. When the hunger pains became too incessant to ignore, she decided she would brave the downstairs.Going from her room to the kitchen counted as progress, right?

 

Something easy, Max searched for. She didn’t think she could stomach anything like a whole meal. She vaguely remembered after Chloe died, Kate and Warren came over to bring her food and the meals stayed in the fridge for a month. Kate was the only one who tried to come around, these days. Even Warren got tired of it. With that depressing thought, she decided on a can of off-brand tomato soup. 

 

She followed the directions, and was actually excited to eat. Getting the bowl of her probably awful soup out of the microwave, she was startled to hear a voice behind her. Max turned to find the source of the voice, and felt her whole world stop.

 

“Hey, Max!” The undeniable voice of Chloe Price rang in her ears. Everything else was silent, but her voice was magnifying. “Long time, no see! Has it been six months already?” 

 

Max was aware of the bowl of soup burning the tips of her fingers, but it didn’t hurt in comparison to the tightness in her chest. “C-Chloe?” She asked, her own voice sounded far away. “Is that really you?”

 

The Chloe scoffed, but smiled. “I don’t know, is it?” She teased, something the  _ real  _ Chloe would do. “I’ve missed you, Max. How is Joyce?”

 

Max swallowed. “ _ You  _ miss  _ me? _ ” She was the one who was still alive, so why did she miss her? Chloe was dead, wasn’t she? Max couldn’t decipher what was real right now. She had seen Chloe in her dreams and that felt real enough. So, was this a dream or was Chloe really in her kitchen?

 

“Of course I do, Super Max.” Chloe said, as if it were obvious. “I’m here chilling with Rachel, but she’s not you, Max.” Rachel Amber is dead, so Chloe Price is dead.

 

“Stop it.” Max said, forcing herself to tear her gaze away from Chloe. “You’re not real.” The girl said, trying to ground herself. She already felt so disconnected from reality, if she didn't then something would happen. She couldn’t handle it. 

 

“Of course you would say that.” Chloe sneered. There was a cruel look in her normally happy blue eyes. “You’ll pass me off again, like always.”

 

Max felt her throat close up, and her chest tighten. “No. That’s not true, I did everything I could…”

 

Chloe crossed her arms, turning up her nose. “That’s funny, Max! Is that why you wouldn’t let me take that money? Why did you let David slap me?” The hallucination got closer. “Did you even think about Joyce? What have you put her though, Max? First her husband and now me! You ruined her life! You would have saved  _ me _ . Why didn’t you?”

 

“Stop!” Max yelped, her tone was desperate. Her hands were shaking and burning, and she let the bowl of soup fall to the floor, shattering. “You’re  _ not _ Chloe!” Max repeated that a few times, sliding down to the floor. 

 

Chloe did the same. “You’re right. Do you want to see her, Max?” Chloe sounded sensual, and motioned at the mess in front of her. “This looks like blood.” 

 

The cogs in Max’s head woke up, and she turned to look at the illusion. “ _ I want to see Chloe again _ .” Max whined, hopeless. She thought she sounded like a child.

 

“You know what to do, Max.” Chloe said, watching Max pick up a shard from the broken glass bowl. “You’ll see me again, and Rachel, and William!”

 

Max gasped when she felt the searing pain of her pressing the shard into the skin of her wrist. It hurt like nothing she had done before. 

 

And then suddenly, Max Caulfield was all alone. The promising dream of being a photographer that she had a year ago was burned, and she saw, in her mind, a picture of her in an art gallery shift into a picture of her sitting on the floor of her family kitchen, bleeding out. It was weird. This was the most calm she had been in six months. The promise of not being here anymore,  _ of not being in pain anymore,  _ calmed Max so much that she wasn’t afraid to die. 

 

However, the universe had different plans for Maxine Caulfield. 

 

Her mom was the first one to see her. Grocery bags were dropped to the floor as the ever worried Vanessa Caulfield rushed over to hold her daughter, for what she hoped was not the last time. Suddenly, hearing the wailing of her mother and hearing her father scramble to call 911 in time, Max felt scared. It didn’t hurt much anymore, she just felt hazy. 

 

Blue eyes fluttered, looking at her mom. “I’m so sorry.” She whispered, lazily. “I don’t want to die.” 

 

Max couldn’t even make out what was said to her before she blacked out. For now, nothing hurt and no one thoughts were in her mind. For the first time, Max felt at peace.

*******

 

Nathan Prescott was the celebrity of Saint Gertrude Psychiatric Hospital. He was rich, young and had many things that the other patients here  _ dreamed  _ of having. That being said, Nathan Prescott was the single most hated patient here. He was a murder, a sick person who drugged girls for his own sick twisted pleasure; or that’s what everyone thought.

 

The Jefferson/Prescott trial was short, and all parties got what they wanted. Mark Jefferson was found guilty of the death of Rachel Amber, the drugging of multiple girls, and abuse. He would spend the rest of his life in a max security prison. The verdict that the young Prescott got outraged the whole town. He didn’t think he could ever forget Chloe’s mom sobbing like that in the middle of the courtroom. The judge was, of course, paid off by Sean Prescott. It would be much worse to have the stain of a criminal son, so having an insane son was the next best thing. Since Nathan was not found guilty of actually killing Rachel Amber and Max had accidently proved that Chloe had pushed Nathan and caused him to shoot her, he wasn’t facing much jail time. Instead, he would just have to be treated at a psychiatric facility for an indeterminate amount of time, and then serve a reduced sentence. 

 

Which, in Nathan’s words, was total bullshit.

 

He wished Jefferson had just stuck a gun in his mouth and ended it then. Then, he wouldn’t have to worry about his father being disgraced, fucking nurses and doctors up his ass all the time, or just the day to day trials of being mentally ill. If Nathan was dead, everyone would be happy. It didn’t matter if he lived or died. But, you try killing yourself when you’re on 23 hour a day watch.

 

Six fucking months and nothing was getting better. No visits, no phone calls, no help. He figured maybe he’d get a call from Kristine or, shit, Victoria Chase but nothing. He figured life couldn’t get any worse, so may as well wallow in it. 

 

That is, until he got word of the newest addition to this Hell hole.

 

Free time for Nathan meant staring at a mute TV in a room with several other people. He didn’t talk much these days. Of course, orderlies were all around, in case something went wrong.

 

“Did you hear?” A male orderly that looked to his friend. “That girl, the one that was in the bathroom when…” he trailed off, noticing that said person who did the shooting was in the room. “Maxine, I think.”

 

“Yeah, what about her?” the other asked, her tone hushed. 

 

“She tried to kill herself. I mean, can’t say I blame her but, shit.” He said, shrugging.

 

“Is that a good idea; to have the person who witnessed Prescott shoot that poor girl  _ and  _ Prescott in the same place?”

 

_ No, no, no.  _ Nathan thought, bringing his hands up to his head.  _ Anything but Caulfeild. Anyone but her.  _

 

The gossips sighed, moving to restrain the boy, was already shaking. “I guess next time we should wait to gossip until break…” The girl muttered.

 

Nathan wished he was dead more than ever right now.

**Author's Note:**

> idk where i'm going w this tbh


End file.
